Circa 1975 Sense and Nonsense

Limericks are a lot of fun. All my life, I have been trying to write at least one very bad limerick. I understand a limerick has to be really bad to be good. My limericks are either too good to be bad, or more often they are so bad they have neither rhyme nor reason. Badness is relative and it possible to be so bad that a superlative must be used, such as worse.

Having just re-read the limerick about the man from Nantucket who kept all his cash in a bucket, the terrible urge to write another limerick has again struck me. Living in a place called Fraser Lake has stifled this urge for years. There is no way I can write a limerick about Fraser Lake. There are too many syllables or something. Vanderhoof is scarcely better. If anyone can write a limerick about either of these two towns will they please send me a copy? I shall add them to my collection of bad verse.

There are however some dandy villages in our area which are very rhyme-able. Sometimes one has to bend the pronunciation a bit. The “g’s” in the following verse have to be accentuated to rhyme with Engen:

A singer who sang was from Engen,
In the shower her voice would be ringin’
But she showered too often,
Caught cold and a cold an’
Thus ended her professional singin’.

A gal who lives out in Fort Fraser,
Has a dog which seems to amaze her,
When she packs for vacation,
This dog, an Alsatian,
Unpacks all her clothes which delays her!

There once was a man from Endako,
Whose living was made with a backhoe,
With this rig he did dig a hole that was big,
‘Twas sad, cause he never came back, Oh!

Finally, we once lived in a small town called Barriere in Southern BC which is a very rhyme-able place indeed.

A lady who lives down in Barriere,
Had “Barrett” tattooed on her derriere,
Her boyfriend named Fred was a Socred who said,
If it weren’t for her derrière, I’d marry ‘er!

Note: The government in opposition at the time was Social Credit or “Socred”.
In about 1990, I finally came up with a limerick for Fraser Lake:
Fraser Lake’s along Highway 16,
It’s a place where most folks haven’t been,
If you walk, run or slither ‘tween Prince George and Smithers,
You’ll find us ‘bout halfway between!